September 24th, 2009
“I think that each town should have a park, or rather a primitive forest of five hundred or a thousand acres, either in one body or several – where a stick should never be cut for fuel – nor for the navy, nor to make wagons, but stand…a common possession forever, for instruction and recreation” – Henry David Thoreau
By Barbara Kessler
Green Right Now
America’s most beloved treehugger said it better than anyone more than 150 years ago when he padded around Walden Wood on foot, marveling at the harmony of nature and fretting about its future.
But while Thoreau’s sentiments were lost in the din of industrial progress, they never died.
They are alive in the hearts of many Americans. The Union of Concerned Scientists has brought together some of these modern Thoreaus in an anthology of short essays, Thoreau’s Legacy: American Stories about Global Warming (Penguin Classic, June 2009). These vignettes by regular folks worried about global warming, species loss, pollution and the future of our natural spaces may just move you to action in your own neighborhood.
Many of the essayists are scientists, botanists and ecologists, engaged in trying to save the planet, or some corner of it. Their contributions give the book a degree of authority as they explain about the sea bears, salmon, butterflies and plants threatened by global warming.
In a story called “Garden of Ghosts,” biologist Mark Hixon tells how one day the trees in a wonderful “Eden” that he’d been studying all turned “white as snow” — a reaction to warming temperatures. Imagine an ecosystem so drastically affected that its trees suddenly die. (I won’t spoil the kicker here.)
But at least half of the authors in Thoreau’s Legacy are people from other disciplines and a variety of places. These writers, educators, business owners, clergy, fishermen and farmers, from New England to the Pacific Northwest, tell more personal stories. They reminisce about earlier times and how progress has stressed the land. They share how they’re trying to save energy and live more lightly on the planet, and speak eloquently of their love of home and the nature around it.
Some of their stories are irretrievably sad.
Melissa M. Juchniewicz recalls growing up near Walden Pond where “I went to sleep on summer nights to the deafening music of the bullfrogs.” Today, those frogs are gone. “Years later, when I visited my mother at White Pond [near Walden], I was stunned by the silence. In that whole summer night, I didn’t hear a single frog.”
Juchniewicz tells how she doesn’t mind sharing her hometown with others, but the loss of the frogs to pollution, pesticides and ultra-violet rays is a “boundless tragedy.”
This book does seem to convey boundless tragedy. There are fading glaciers, strip mines, threatened dolphins, acidifying oceans.
But the ardor and determination of many of the essayists gives us hope.
Jennifer B. Freeman, a freelance science writer, tells how she and her kids offered to cancel unwanted catalogs for the people in their apartment building. In one day, her family canceled 85 catalogs for grateful neighbors.
“Doing favors for the planet is good for your soul,” Freeman writes. “Perhaps that’s why our family continued to get notes like this one, from a friend for whom we canceled fifty-nine catalogs in a week. She said “I feel clean, purged and righteous.”
Thoreau’s Legacy is available from the non-profit Union of Concerned Scientists at their website in a limited edition hardcover. An interactive version can be downloaded for free, and there’s an ebook available from Penguin Classics.
The full-color book makes a nice table copy, given that guests could read an essay or two while they wait for their wine. It includes a forward by Barbara Kingsolver.
Copyright © 2009 Green Right Now | Distributed by Noofangle Media
